


Saving The World With Friends Is Always Easier

by canadianBwithanITCH



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: F/F, F/M, Fix-It, M/M, Self-Insert, Time Travel Fix-It
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-08-30
Updated: 2020-12-15
Packaged: 2021-03-06 15:34:47
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 6
Words: 11,942
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26201236
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/canadianBwithanITCH/pseuds/canadianBwithanITCH
Summary: Kendra and her best friend Lana were out for a drive like most other nights, until Kendra's poor brand new car became a port key and transported the pair into 1991 London. Now, they must use their knowledge of the books and movies to navigate the world and help the golden trio along the way. And save as many others as they could too. *semi canon compliant
Relationships: Cedric Diggory/Harry Potter, Daphne Greengrass/Original Female Character(s), Draco Malfoy/Original Female Character(s), Harry Potter/Ginny Weasley, Hermione Granger/Ron Weasley, Luna Lovegood/Harry Potter, Neville Longbottom/Ginny Weasley, Neville Longbottom/Luna Lovegood
Comments: 3
Kudos: 23





	1. What Where What Who How

**Author's Note:**

  * For [LannaBanzai](https://archiveofourown.org/users/LannaBanzai/gifts).



> Hola! This is mostly just for my friend and I, but feel free to tag along on this wild ride. It WILL BE chaotic as all hell, or maybe it'll be mostly a normal story. Who the heck knows right now, I'm only 2000 words into this thing (ish). Enjoy!

As Kendra and Lana were driving through the winding backroads of Nanaimo, BC, they were going over the events of each others’ lives in the last few weeks. It had been a while since they’d seen one another, and Kendra had finally secured a new car. So of course the first thing Kendra does with it is pick Lana up to waste gas and dick around the city.

  
She was currently trying to figure out how to drift her automatic front wheel drive car, a 2015 forest green Kia Optima to be specific. Jinglepot road at 2am was the perfect spot to practice. The curves were just right, and with high beams on, the five-ish deer nearby were easy to spot. Until they weren’t.

All of a sudden, a bright white light enveloped the car and Kendra lost control, she spun out, and the last twenty-two years of her life flashed before her eyes as she fully expected her poor brand-new car wrapped around a tree or something.

  
Kendra was ready to curse the existence of aftermarket headlights as she felt Lana grip her arm in what felt like a vice.

As they spun, it felt as though a hook took hold of them from their navels. Kendra thought to try and put the car in Park, which she managed successfully.

  
As the world around them stopped spinning, they came to an abrupt, jarring stop somewhere incredibly disorienting. They took several minutes to recuperate before both looking around at their surroundings. Kendra’s first notice was that they were on the wrong side of the road. The buildings looked significantly older than what she was used to. The style of clothing around them was so different to the clothes on her own body.

  
Her clothes did feel baggier, but she paid that no mind for the moment. She looked over at Lana, hoping that her friend saw what she was. Lana was staring wide-eyed at her, and did not look like the girl she’s familiar with.

  
“Lana?” she coughed.

  
The girl next to her nodded, her short blonde curls so different from the previously long blue hair. Her height was the same, but she didn’t fill out Lana’s clothes the way she had just seen.

  
“Kendra?” Lana asked, and she nodded back. She looked in her rear-view mirror, and the person looking back at her made her cringe hard. The unkempt, mousey hair of her childhood and much more slender face stared back at her.

  
Dazed and confused, Kendra turned her car off and pulled her keys from the ignition. She gave the surrounding area another once over, noting the difference in vehicles as well.

Her Optima would stick out like a sore thumb.

  
“This place look to you like it does to me?” she asked Lana hopefully.

  
“I think so? You’re a child.” Lana pressed the palms of her hands into her eyes as she said this, and then blinked and looked around again.

  
“So are you. This is England right?”

  
“Or elsewhere in the UK, but these cars don’t quite look like the photos from your trip.”

  
“I thought so too. Should we get out and look around? Or maybe try driving to somewhere I could leave the car long term? I can’t see any pay parking metres anywhere.”

  
Lana tapped her small chin, let’s get out and look around. "Long enough to get our bearings? I have an idea but I want to confirm it.”

  
Kendra nodded, and unclipped her seatbelt. “If you think what I’m thinking, I’m kinda excited.”

  
Lana opened her door, “not if it’s either of the times I think it might be.”

  
“Shit, you’re right. Harry Potter right? Same braincell?”

  
Lana laughed and quickly covered her mouth. “Yeah, same braincell. But, we’ll have to watch our words if it is that time, and also, my last name is not common anywhere here, so if it is when we think it is, we’re sisters, we’re Irish and both of us go by your last name?”

  
Kendra waited for Lana to close her door before tapping the lock button, and pocketing her keys. “Probably the safest option hey? So Lana and Kendra McCarthy. Wait but we don’t sound Irish at all… I think.”

  
Lana scanned the area once again, now that they could see more, she pointed at a box labelled ‘The Times.’ They walked over, thankfully not too far from the car, and pulled out a copy of that day’s news.

  
She scanned it for a date and found July 24th, 1991. This was the day of the first attempt at delivering Harry Potter’s Hogwarts letter. “Shit, Kendra it is when we thought it’d be.”  
“So, what next then?”

  
They walk back over to the car.  
“Well,” Lana breathes, “I think we ought to confirm if we have magic or not, cause if we do, we’ll have to get directly involved. If not, maybe we can get in contact with someone we can trust and figure out why we’re here. We should also figure out what time travel rules to follow. Since your car seemed to become a portkey that brought us back in time, it may not be time-turner rules. Though the ‘don’t come in contact with yourself or your relatives’ rule that’s pretty common is basically moot on this side of the world.”

  
“Not necessarily. Though we’re in London, I have a line of ancestry in Ireland. What if they’re magical? Oh! A theory! What if they’re magical, and my ancestors fled Ireland to Canada when Grindelwald was doing his thing.”

  
“Kendra that’s a dumb theory,” Lana rolled her eyes playfully, “you showed me your tree, if you have magical ancestry here, the branch that created you would have come overseas long before Grindelwald.”

  
“Well, I tried. So, how old do you think we are?”

  
Kendra and Lana stood back by the car, looking at themselves in the mirrors. “Eleven,” they said together.

  
They decided their best course of action for now would be to find a map and see if they could find Charing Cross Road, where they knew the Leaky Cauldron would be. They looked through the contents of Kendra’s car, Kendra checking her wallet for her license, in case they did need to drive somewhere, as ridiculous as it would look with an eleven-year-old in the drivers seat.

  
The ID slot was completely empty. But her debit, credit and cash were all still inside. She looked over at Lana, noticing the same for her. No ID, money still there.

  
“Do you think ATMs still exist?” Kendra asked after a moment.

  
“We could google it? Wait when was google invented? Wait check your phone!” Lana scrambled to pull out her IPhone. It was fully charged for sure, but nothing about it worked. Kendra tried hers, and while it tried to turn on, she was also unsuccessful.

  
“Shit,” she breathed out.

  
“Realistically, what was I expecting? We went back in time, of course tech from our time wouldn’t work.”

  
“Well, I have a couple of my competition bags in here, and my gym bag. Let’s see what’s easy to take with us?”

  
Kendra opened her trunk and grabbed out her two bright orange swimming bags and passed one to Lana, both bags had McCarthy embroidered on them, so it worked out as a bonus to Lana being her fake sister.

  
They both emptied the swim gear inside onto the back seat of the car, except the towels. Then, they went through all the clothing Kendra had already tossed into the back seat and the trunk in the short time she’d owned the car. They had a solid number of clothes between the both of them, though most of it would be very baggy all things considered.

  
Knowing that they wouldn’t need or really get to see the car again, Kendra left her keys behind, only grabbing the small pocketknife that she kept on her keychain.

  
“Alright then,” Lana said, “there should be somewhere with a map nearby, and with any luck somewhere with currency exchange. And an ATM if they exist.”

  
They didn’t have to wander far to find a currency exchange storefront. They must have landed in a high tourist traffic area. They pulled all the money they thought they could off their cards at the ATM, and then bent the cards and tossed them, and then they went up to the teller with their Canadian money –not what they just got from the ATM— and spent at least half an hour trying to get the older man to change it for them without parents around.

  
Though the man had questioned why they had Canadian currency as they (according to him) sounded very much Irish. He’d specified it a Munster accent, so they hurriedly said they’d just gotten back from a Canadian vacation visiting overseas family, and now staying in London visiting friends and their parents had asked them to go exchange their money back before meeting them at a nearby restaurant.

  
Once they finally had Euros on them, they asked the man for a map, naming a random restaurant they’d seen on the way there. He gave them one in the form of a brochure and circled the restaurant, pointing in the general direction of it.

  
The pair walked until they were out of sight and sat on a bench. The first thing they did was count their money. Kendra spoke after recounting it twice more, “wow, more than I thought.”

  
Between them, they had 4500 euros. “That should be plenty in the wizarding world right? If that’s where we’re going?”

  
“At first, yeah probably.” Lana tucks it all away into her coin purse, and then opens the brochure map. They locate where they are, on a road only five blocks away from Charing Cross Road. “Onward?”

  
Kendra nods and they stand up, walking in the direction of the road. “Will we know what the Leaky Cauldron looks like when we see it?"

  
Lana shrugs, “I assume so? We’ve seen it enough in the movies, which were pretty close to how it was described in the books as well.”

  
They do their best to just walk with the flow of the crowd, looking around occasionally for anyone who may be a wizard that they knew from the series, or just looked out of place to the muggles in general. By the time they reached the street that the Leaky Cauldron should be on, neither of them had spotted one.

  
“North or South Lana?” she looked both ways down the road and saw that the North direction had less people and looked older. Lana grabbed Kendra’s hand to make it easier and tugged her that way. They walk until they see an old brick building that looked sketchy. The only place in the area that had no traffic and the only place without an active business.

  
“This is it, right?” looking around, Kendra appeared nervous and Lana nodded.

  
“Has to be, and the fact that it looks abandoned has to be wards I think.”

  
“If we make it through, we’re magic now?”

  
“And will have to get involved directly.” Lana started marching forward, giving Kendra a hard tug to follow her, but Kendra and her clumsiness tripped over her own shoes and tumbled headfirst into the Leaky Cauldron.

  
“Magic it is then,” Lana said to herself, walking in gracefully behind Kendra.


	2. Here we go

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This thing took way too much research for what it is lmao. Legit like six hours of googling for less than half of the chapter.

Lana reached down to help Kendra stand, entirely used to her antics. With both of them standing, they look around the Leaky Cauldron with interest. It is exactly how they’d expected it to look, the patrons around them were an interesting bunch, but the face they were looking for? Lana saw him behind the bar.

“There he is,” Lana pointed, “that’s Tom.”

Lana lead them over to him, taking care to weave through the witches and wizard’s sitting and standing throughout the pub.

“Hi,” Kendra spoke. “We’re a couple of muggleborns, found out last week you see. Our parents left us nearby here and we were drawn to this building and apparently rightfully so. We don’t have anything but euros on us right now but could you help us?”

Tom took several long moments to regard the two children. This wasn’t the first time he’d seen this happen to muggleborn children, but he also knew that the Hogwarts letters were released today, and wasn’t sure which professor would have came to tell them a whole week before then. Regardless, he felt bad for them, especially the messy haired one that fell through his door.

“I’ll tell you what,” he said, deciding to help them out a little. “This time and only this time, I’ll feed you both on the house, then maybe a professor from Hogwarts will stop by who can bring you through to the alley and exchange your money.”

“Oh yes please,” Kendra said, realizing then just how hungry she was.

“Thank you,” Lana spoke up, hearing her stomach grumble.

“What are your names?”

“I’m Lana, and this is my sister Kendra.” Lana was going to tell them what part of Ireland they were from, but she wasn’t sure, and Kendra knew her heritage real well.

“We’re from Cork!” Kendra couldn’t help but giggle at the word.

“Cork eh? That’s a long way from here.” Tom made eye contact with someone behind them. “Oh would you look at that kids? Professor Minerva McGonagall is here, looks like she has a couple letters on her too. Maybe they’re yours?”

Tom waved Minerva over, and then set a couple plates down in front of them.

“Evening Tom, butterbeer for now?” Minerva spoke to the man with a smile. “Hello you two. I believe these are for you? Lana and Kendra McCarthy?”

“Yes Ma’am,” they say together. Minerva passes out the letters, seemingly knowing which is which.

“Your names came up on my registry just as I was making up the letters this morning. The locating charm said here, so I assumed your parents must have just left you both here? Though I’m not sure how they’d know… anyways dears, my name is Professor McGonagall, I’m the deputy headmistress of Hogwarts school of Witchcraft and Wizardry and if you’d like, I can bring you into the alley and change any muggle money you may have? And set you up with accommodations here until the school year?”

“We'd like that very much Professor McGonagall,” Lana says, smiling as if this was all new to her. She shared a look with Kendra, they’d have to spend a lot of what they have.

Minerva sipped slowly at her butterbeer, finishing just as they finished their dinners. Minerva gestured to the back of the pub and they followed, though they didn’t need to, all they needed from their soon-to-be professor was access to the alley.

“So girls, I hate to ask, but how much did your parents leave you with financially?”

Kendra looked up at Minerva, which felt odd, she’s still adjusting to being much younger. “We don’t have a lot, I think? I don’t really know how much we’re actually gonna need. We have 4500 euros.”

“Well, between the both of you, should you choose to get an owl, it should cost you a little less than half of that for your supplies.”

As they walked, Minerva went over each store they’d need to go to, though she’d help them track down each of their supplies. They made it to Gringotts and Minerva opted to wait for them outside.

After locating the right desk, they waited to be called up to the goblin. Once at his desk, he grumbled out a, “what do you need?”

“We’d like to start a family vault,” Lana said, gesturing between herself and Kendra.

“Surname?”

Lana started to say her normal one, when Kendra jumped in, “McCarthy.”

“Am I exchanging currency for you as well?”

They nod and Lana passes over her coin purse. “We have 4500 euros.”

“I will assign you a goblin to take care of your vault, I will exchange these and pass them over to him and he will come and get you to finalize some things.”

The goblin pointed them to a seating area, where no one else was waiting just then. They settled into chairs far more comfortable than the banks they were used to.

“Okay so what do we do about money after this year?” Kendra panicked.

“McGonagall said we’d be using half, so that’s two years here if we’re stuck long term, which we should assume we are.”

“Lana that’s only two years, and we’re ELEVEN now we can’t work between the school years. Fuck where are we gonna stay?”

A goblin similar to the one they’d just talked to walked in front of them, “good evening Ms. McCarthy’s, I hear we are setting you up a family vault? Follow me to my office.”

They stood and followed him wordlessly to a space behind the tall podiums that the teller-goblins stood at. “Proigs is my name, I handle the creation of new vaults in the British ministry sect of Gringotts.”

He sits behind his desk and gestures for them to sit in the same style of chairs as the waiting area. “We have already converted your muggle money into our currency, we just need to confirm that you are both who you claim to be, and then we can go about picking an available vault number and how we will be identifying you both when you come here to access your vault.”

Lana looks at Kendra, sending a silent ‘what the heck do we do’ her way. Kendra just shrugged at her; all they could do was trust the process. Magic had already altered their accents, and their Hogwarts letters said McCarthy on them both.

Kendra rock paper scissored her way into having to go first, and Proigs led her through a door behind his desk, where he took a few drops of blood and asked some questions under a very small dose of veritaserum. Luckily the way they were worded Kendra didn’t need to even go near the fact that they weren’t even from this universe really. Somehow, the lies they’d decided on came out just fine with the serum as if they were true.

It made her wonder if even their blood had been altered by magic.

Proigs returned her to his office and took Lana to the back, who while amazed by everything they’d decided was there story was being taken as fact, kind of expected that. She sat back down and Proigs confirmed that everything did indeed match up and that doing this was a measure to prevent fraud and robbery, and their answers and blood records would be kept but very securely. Once they had wands, the bank would take those on record as well.

“Alright ladies how would you like to be identified to access your vault? Once we have your wands on record, we can use them to identify you, but we can also use a blood sample instead or as well.”

Kendra eyed Lana, and as they nodded at each other, they spoke in unison like true twins. “Wands as well as until we have them?”

“Until you have them?”

“Yeah,” Lana said, “once we’ve got them, just our wands is perfectly fine.”

Proigs nodded and made a note of this on a piece of parchment and stamped it with something rather official looking.

“Will you both want separate vaults off the family one?”

“Not for years to come, not until we can add money to it consistently.” Lana answered for them.

“Alright so add off-vaults on graduation most likely. Will this be the same rule for future generations’ vaults as well?”

“Proigs, we are uh, eleven, can we revisit that in say, ten years?” Kendra laughed nervously.

He nods, making a note of this as well. “Lastly, your vault number.”

Proigs laid out a parchment with available vaults within the network, they decided it must have been charmed to update on its own.

“654” Lana said without a beat. Proigs waved his hand and the vault number disappeared from the parchment. A second piece appeared, and he had them sign it and the vault was officially theirs.

“Vault 654 is now known as the McCarthy family vault. Now, because of policy, you will have to come in and withdraw your money to use it until you maintain a minimum balance of 6000 galleons for an extended period of time. Once this is achieved, you will be able to have businesses charge your account directly.”

They nod and grin at each other. “Can we take out what we need for our first-year supplies now?”

Proigs gives them a creepy goblin grin and leads them through another door out of his office space. Upon seeing the minecart, Kendra could already feel the need to throw up. “Right, we go in this thing?”

Regardless, they pile in and Proigs gives them a bag with an extension and lightening charm. At the door to their vault, he produces a key. He turns the lock and looks back at them. He gestured to the coins within and it seemed as if half of them vanished, but Lana checked the bag and they were sitting within.

“This key is yours to keep, and any future access to your vaults you will go through the regular tellers.” With that he passed them the key, which Lana dropped into the bag for now as well. Proigs returned them to the main part of Gringotts, where Minerva was waiting for them.

“Alright girls, I’ve got things set up for you at the Leaky Cauldron until August 31st, on the morning of September 1st, the Hogwarts gamekeeper Hagrid will bring you and one other student to the Hogwarts Express. See you both in a month.”

As it turns out, by set up, Minerva meant that Tom was charging her personal vault for the nights-to-be and three meals a day.

They collected their room key from Tom and found it above the pub. They set their bags down _finally_ and collapsed on their beds. Both were asleep within seconds.


	3. Diagon Alley

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I used one line of Hagrid's from the book, nearly Verbatim. "“Listen, Harry, would yeh mind if I slipped off fer a pick-me-up in the Leaky Cauldron? I hate them Gringotts carts.” He did still look a bit sick," pg. 76 of Philosophers Stone.
> 
> I wrote this instead of did classwork. I'm a little less than one week into my ninth semester of uni and already procrastinating, woops?

Kendra and Lana took the next couple of days to adjust to the new world. Thanks to the excitement of day one, it hadn’t felt like they’d been awake as long as they were, but they’d been awake for a full day and slept through the next.

Once refreshed, they wandered down into the main pub and saw Minerva there once again.

“Good morning girls,” she said, looking them both over. “I noticed that you’re both wearing clothing significantly bigger than yourselves, and thought I would return and offer a helping hand in the form of a few fitting charms?”

They shared a look, she must think they may be Gryffindors. “Please professor, we’d love that.”

Minerva followed them up to their room, and first cast the spell on the clothes they were wearing, and then on the clothes in each of the provided drawers.

She took one look at the two swimming bags that they had and said, “you know what girls, one last thing. It’ll save you a few galleons for the train perhaps.”

She delicately waved her wand over Kendra’s orange one, and it transfigured into a sleek looking leather trunk with an orange tinge to it. Then she waved her wand over the other bag, this one looked the same but with a slight pink to it, as that was the initial colour of the bag.

“Thank you so much professor,” Kendra said, her eyes beginning to water a little.

“Absolutely no trouble at all girls, now, I shall see you both at Hogwarts.” Minerva did an elegant turn and walked out of their room.

Kendra had sunk onto her bed, eyes still watering, a few tears had leaked down her cheeks. Lana sat down next to her and rested a hand on her shoulder. Once Kendra got control of her tears, she laughed lightly.

“Was going to make a joke that being eleven again made me more susceptible to crying but,”

“You’d have cried if you met Minerva McGonagall regardless. We know this.” Lana laid back, laughing with her.

“She’s more motherly than I thought she would be and looks so similar to Maggie Smith.”

After that, they opened their new trunks and realized that Minerva had gone as far as doing a featherlight charm for them as well, the trunks were separated into compartments within, one with no spacers, one with different sized spacers, uniform spacers and one that just had shelves. For transfigured athletic bags they were incredible.

Kendra cried again and then they went downstairs for lunch.

This was their routine for a couple of days. They’d go out and make sure they knew their way around the alley, then eat at the inn and hang out in their room.

On August 1st, they decided it was time to do their shopping, and attempt to apprehend Harry Potter as well. Hopefully, he’d allow them, as he’d be pretty overwhelmed with everything this day.

Kendra sobbed for an hour or two in the early morning, wishing her brother in their home universe, dimension, whatever, a happy 18th birthday.

They ate breakfast downstairs, where there were significantly more witches and wizards than usual, including professor Quirinus Quirrell in one corner. As the space was a cacophony of chatter, they could only assume that Harry had been through already.

Well that, and everyone was shopping for their supplies starting today. There was an excess of teens everywhere on top of the adults as well, especially spilling into the alley. The bricks had no time to close, reminding them of elevator doors that kept getting pressed on to stay open.

They made their way down to the end of the alley, loitering until they saw the giant man that was Hagrid emerge from the bank. He and the small Harry Potter that was with him looked identical to how they expected, down to the green eyes that were supposedly like his mother’s.

Making sure they appeared as nervous as possible, they approached. Harry looked incredibly guarded. “Hello,” Lana spoke, “are you Hagrid? We were brought here a couple of days ago by Professor McGonagall and she told us to find you when you’d bring us to Hogwarts at the end of the month. But we’re hoping for some help with school supplies as well?”

Hagrid nodded thoughtfully, “Of course lasses what are your names?”

“I’m Lana, and this is my twin Kendra.” Lana gestured between them, and they could practically see the ‘oh no’ go off in his head, likely thinking of them similarly to the Weasley twins already.

“Well alright then. Couple o’ muggle-borns are yeh?” they nodded. “Listen, Harry, would you mind if I slipped off for a pick-me-up from the Leaky Cauldron? I hate them Gringotts carts.”

He left them out front of Madam Malkin’s shop, and Harry stood awkwardly, likely waiting for them to fawn over him as many wizards already had that day. Kendra stepped towards him first.

“Hello, Harry was it? Guess we do not have to re-introduce ourselves. We’re from Cork in Ireland.” She looked back at Lana briefly, “a couple of muggle-born orphans we are.”

Kendra thought she heard a poorly concealed giggle from Lana as she watched Harry’s limbs loosen up.

“My name is Harry yeh, I’m an orphan too I guess, but I do have a family I live with.” He stuck out his hand and Kendra shook it firmly.

“Not us, we just have what money was left to us, which isn’t much. The professor that collected us is paying for our room and board for the next month until we go off to Hogwarts.” Lana spoke, stepping up next to them.

“I’m sorry you two,” he said, then looked behind them as he heard the door open and close.

Out pranced Draco Malfoy, who held himself more arrogantly than Kendra could have imagined. Lana watched him intensely, which, she supposed is why he turned to look at them. He must have felt her gaze. Draco’s sneer softened only slightly as he made to speak.

“Hogwarts students, are you?” he asked. They nodded, “suppose I’ll be seeing you then.”

With that, he strutted off most likely in the direction of his father, who if Kendra remembered correctly was at the broom-shop.

The lady that greeted them was not Madam Malkin, but upon seeing the three of them, she bustled over.

“Hogwarts, yes?” she asked, “C’mon then, step up the three of you.”

The other lady in the room had Lana step on her stool, and Malkin took Harry, then hollered to the back for a third witch, who hurried to the front and began fitting Kendra for her robes. As the witches worked, Lana and Kendra chatted avidly with Harry, who would ask simple questions about the area, since he knew that they’d been there a few days.

Once their new robes were complete, Kendra and Lana carefully counted out the amount that Madam Malkin requested. Harry was a bit more careless, grabbing a large handful of galleons from his sack. He counted out what he needed and dropped the rest back in.

Harry had initially offered to pay for all three of their robes, but they insisted they had enough at least for their supplies, but they may consider letting him pay for ice-cream later or something. Hagrid waited for them just outside the shop, holding the aforementioned treat for each of them.

“Hagrid,” Harry spoke meekly, “could I maybe stay here? At the Leaky Cauldron. Like Kendra and Lana are doing?”

They’d spoken at length about their accommodations while being fitted. This is what they’d hoped for, to get him away from the Dursley’s for a whole month.

Hagrid stroked his mighty beard with his large hand, “I will go ask Professor Dumbledore while you three get your wands, it’s the last stop for us today and can certainly take ages.”

Harry got excited, “Professor Dumbledore? Is he here?”

“Sorry Harry, he isn’t. But I can access him easily enough from here. You just can’t come with me.”

They made their way through the alley, pausing at each needed shop, and the girls watched as their sack of coins quickly dwindled. Their vault key becoming visible at the bottom of the sack.

Then they came to the Owl Emporium, the second last shop. Lana and Kendra had decided yesterday that they did, in fact, want an owl. As much as they missed their cats, a mail carrier would be their most efficient choice, and they could always get a cat or two later in life.

Harry very nearly picked out a small barn owl, before Kendra hastily pointed at the snowy that would become Hedwig. He was immediately enamoured with the bird and picked him for Hagrid to purchase as his birthday gift.

Lana and Kendra looked at their coins, after seeing that the different sized owls were different costs. They were fully prepared to only afford a small one, but upon counting their coins they realized that Proigs had given them enough for two trunks, which they ended up not needing.

They had a little extra to spare then and intended to save most of it for treats on the train or something, even though they knew Harry would inevitably buy out the whole trolley.

Out of the corner of her eye, Lana saw a brown owl fluff out its feathers. It looked like it had rabbit ears and looked like he was done with the other owls’ shit. Lana tugged on Kendra’s sleeve and pointed. They grinned at each other and pointed him out to Hagrid, who got him down as they told the shop keeper which bird they wanted.

“That one’s a Dusky Eagle Owl, only six months old, had barely left its mothers territory when it came to me during my most recent travelling.” Lana nods and said she wants him for sure, exchanging the galleons for him.

"His name is 150% Greg." Lana said, Kendra high fived her, but Hagrid gave them a strange look. Harry just laughed, used to Muggles naming pets with human names. 

Turning around to leave the shop with Hagrid and Harry, they see him tell Hagrid something that the half-giant seemed to readily agree to. Hagrid walks them to Ollivander’s, telling them he’d return in a couple of hours. If they were done before he returned, to meet him back within the Leaky Cauldron.

Hagrid ambled off in that direction, leaving the trio to stare at the storefront for a few minutes, taking it in before they filed inside, first Harry, then Kendra, then Lana.

Harry had already begun calling out for someone. Ollivander slid dramatically to the front of the store on his ladder. Lana and Kendra sat on some rickety chairs, waiting for Harry to be done. It seemed as though the creepy old man had put up a silencing spell, as neither could hear what was going on. Though it felt like they could, the scene before them was nearly identical to that in the movie.

Both Kendra and Lana had to catch themselves multiple times as they nearly said the lines aloud. At last, Harry’s holly wand produced its sparks, and he beamed as he sat next to them, he sat there staring at the thing, almost unaware, as they got up together.

“Hello sir, Ollivander I bet?” asked Kendra sweetly.

“Yes, that is me, though I can’t seem to recognize you two. Twins I do not know? Peculiar, very peculiar.”

“We are muggle-born, I wouldn’t think any witches and wizards would know us,” Lana said.

He hmmed, then said, “well, I do normally anticipate each young witch and wizard that walks through my door. Curious and curiouser. No matter let us start. Hold out your wand arms for me.”

They each hold out their arm, anticipating Ollivander’s tape measure. He paid attention long enough to switch it over from Kendra to Lana, and watched long enough for the arm measurements on her before he walked off to track down a few wands.

They wagered some future funds on whether or not Ollivander would guess their wands or not. It turns out, not. Lana won. They went through seventeen wands of various lengths and cores and woods each before Kendra let out an accidental giggle.

“What’s funny my dear?” the creepy old wandmaker questioned, “no one has left without a wand before, I’m not about to let that start now.”

Having been caught, she stuttered out, “it’s not that sir, I uh, I uhm I just think you should try a pearwood wand with me, with a unicorn hair core? If you’ve got one.”

Lana hit her as Ollivander stumbled back a few steps, and then hurried off in the direction of Kendra’s soon to be wand. She just shrugged, looking up at the wizard as he returned, this time with a single box.

“Here we are, pearwood, unicorn hair core, 14 inches and rather bendy, a loyal wand.”

Ollivander placed it down before her, and she picked it up. Warm to the touch, it gave off a blinding light that reminded her of Lumos Maxima. “You must be a seer, Ms McCarthy. No other explanation comes by me.”

He turned towards Allana. “Now, with her sorted out, this will be a little easier for me I think. As a twin, let’s try, one of the...”

Batty as he was, he mumbled to himself as he wandered off to find a few more wands. All of which were noes. “How peculiar. A strange circumstance. I’m a little stuck my dear.”

Lana rolled her eyes. They may as well both be seers in this case. “You ought to try something Alder and phoenix feather.”

“Yes, yes, a great wand for a seer, nearly on the same level as your sister’s. Alder’s a flexible wood as well. One moment, I have just the wand.” He teetered off to the very back, disappearing.

“That’s the story we’re giving then?” Lana asked, a bit annoyed.

“Guess so. Sorry, I just got annoyed with waiting. Didn’t want to try every wand in this place.”

“if anything at least using that as a cover will keep us protected? Perhaps not from Volde-bitch but several Slytherins… maybe.”

Lana stopped talking just as Ollivander came back within earshot. He placed this box in front of her, which she promptly picked up and smiled as a soothing warmth enveloped her body. It emitted sparks similar to Harry’s, a brilliant green and silver.

Though they knew what their wands would be, once they were paid for, they still stared at them like Harry was, nearly bumping into each other with every step they took. Hagrid was waiting for them.

“Took you a long time did it? That’s alright, Professor Dumbledore gave you the okay to stay here with them Harry. Said it’d be good of you to make friends before school.”

They thanked him profusely, especially Harry, and then Hagrid set him up with a room, hilariously next to Kendra and Lana’s before taking them to muggle London for dinner.

On that first night, Harry dragged his comforter over to their room to camp out on the floor and stay up the whole night, gaining his first friends.

They didn’t mean to be this friendly with him, but if they were going to change as much as they could for the better while they’re here, especially if they’re stuck here, this would make several things infinitely easier.


	4. Hogwarts

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry I forgot lol. Hogwarts is ahead!

It turns out Harry Potter was similar to Kendra in more ways than she’d wish upon anyone. The books and the films had downplayed Vernon and Petunia Dursley’s abuse so much that Kendra had expected to show him only a bit more kindness than book Ron had shown him when they’d met. 

  
Through the first week of knowing him, she’d observed him unable to finish much of his meals, least of all breakfast. He’d manage a bite or two of eggs and maybe a sausage link. Then he’d skip lunch, often just drinking some water or pumpkin juice, which upon seeing it as an option, Harry had been afraid to try it. 

  
They subtly approached helping his diet by introducing sweet things at first, after that first week watching his food habits, they showed him a treacle tart which they knew from the books were a favourite of his. Tom helped too, in his way. 

  
After that first week, Harry took the three of them out for ice cream almost every day. While they did that, Lana and Kendra had invented a game for them to play, what made it the most fun was trying to do it without Harry noticing. They’d sit at the same table at Florean Fortescue’s every day and name every witch and wizard that walked by. They did pretty well, with Lana in the lead by six wizards and three witches. 

  
Harry came out of his shell around them, appearing as a nearly normal eleven-year-old sometimes. They were joking around and biding their time until they embarked on a journey they once only dreamed of.

  
On the morning of September 1st, when Hagrid came to give them their tickets and drop them off at the train station, they were barely awake. Like the true procrastination experts, they once were, Lana and Kendra were awake until three that night both in excitement and packing their supplies away in their trunks. Harry’d been awake, he’d also packed his trunk when he bought his things like a smart person.

  
Hagrid brought them to the bridge that he had in the movies, and Kendra and Lana looked desperately for a clock to see how much time they had while Harry went through his “where is platform 9 and ¾” dialogue as expected. They had plenty more time then they’d anticipated and were grateful for the few muggle bills Hagrid had given them as he’d had no idea what else to do with them.

  
It seemed that their previous coffee addiction lingered heavily because Kendra spotted a small coffee shop off to the side, which they promptly dashed for and got lattes in to-go cups, and two cups of ice that left the barista a little confused. 

  
Harry had been nearly as confused as the barista, surprised that his eleven-year-old friends would drink something so adult. To which they both just told him not to be them. Then he went back to complaining about not knowing about the platform.

  
It was all that they could do to hold in their laughs. He started to walk towards a station guard when Lana grabbed his sleeve. 

  
“Don’t bother,” she said. The Weasley’s had conveniently passed them at that moment. Lana pointed the oddball family out to him and he just nodded, pushing his trolley in their direction to follow. Lana and Kendra followed too, but much less hurriedly.

  
They had only a couple of moments to decide how they’d act upon seeing the column that they had to walk through. Someone would figure out that something was up if they just walked on through like they may have if they’d gotten this opportunity in their old lives. 

  
When they caught up, Harry was talking to Molly Weasley, he pointed back at them which made them feel obligated to hurry the last few metres to where the Weasley’s stood. Molly went through the flourish of explaining the pillar and had her children go through, then Harry, then Ron, and Molly made Lana and Kendra go through before her.

  
Kendra jogged at the column and once she made it through, she let out a deep breath that she had no clue she’d been holding. The urge to high five Lana when she too made it through was nearly overwhelming, but she held back and instead stared entirely enamoured by the bustle of people, and the train even if she’d seen it and been on it at an expo a few years ago. 

  
Lana stood next to her, observing, taking it all in. They lost Harry in the crowd but didn’t worry too much about it since they knew where he’d end up, and who he’d be with. Once they could tear their eyes away from the steam engine, they scouted for others. The first people they saw were the Grangers, then Neville, then the Malfoys. 

  
Lana almost stepped in his direction but Kendra grabbed her wrist, dragging her over to the Granger family. It was rather obvious on the platform; who was and wasn’t a wizarding family. So when they stepped up next to the Granger family, it was easier for them to say hello.

  
“Hello, are you a muggle-born too?” asked Kendra, looking at Hermione.

  
The little girl’s eye’s lit up, and she started spouting off everything that she’d read about the history of the wizarding world, and asking questions to see if either of them had read the same books. Though they hadn’t, they were able to keep up with her, on their knowledge of the movies and books alone. They were still trying to smooth over what was from which, everything was a decent mix of both. 

  
After a couple of minutes of chatting with Hermione, the student portion of the crowd was thinning out, so they turned to Hermione’s parents who were wondering where their parents are.

  
“Well, you see,” Lana said, staring up at them. “We haven’t had parents for about a year now... and even then it wasn’t great you know? Got lucky in that we were able to find enough money for our supplies.”

  
“Oh dears,” said Mrs. Granger, “I’m so sorry, it’s hard losing family so young. I’m glad that our Hermione and you both are getting along so quickly at least, now it looks like the train will be leaving soon, run along!”

  
They did just that, Lana heading to the trickle of students first, Kendra close behind. Once out of earshot of the Grangers, Kendra laughed nervously. “Laid that on a little thick huh?”

  
Lana just shrugged and watched as the conductor helped levitate student’s belongings into the luggage carriage at the end of the train. They decided to leave their trunks with the other luggage but brought Greg onto the train with them. 

  
“Harry’s compartment?” 

  
“Yeah,” Lana said, holding onto the handle of Greg’s cage tightly. They weaved through students walking until they found who they assumed was Harry and Ron. Upon opening the door, they saw instead Neville and Hermione.

  
“Hey Hermione,” they said together.

  
“Hi, this is Neville. Neville, these two are Kendra and Lana, they’re first years too!”

  
They waved, and awkwardly hung by the door. “Hello!”

  
Kendra looked down at the cardboard box that Neville was keeping Trevor in, “you should seal that until we get to Hogwarts, whatever’s inside could easily escape.”

  
Kendra turns to leave first, and as she does, Lana invites them to come and sit with their other friends. They wander a few doors down and find Harry sitting inside, Ron hadn’t quite made it yet.

  
Lana sat Greg down next to Hedwig, and Neville set his now sealed box down on the bench next to where he sat down. Lana and Kendra took their spots next to Harry, and Hermione sat next to Neville opposite them.

  
After introductions, and the initial shock of meeting ‘the Harry Potter,’ Ron finally came by, asking to sit with the group. He settled himself in, introducing everyone to Scabbers, who Lana and Kendra agreed that they would try to out this year, if only for Sirius’ sake. Then maybe Kendra would get to meet her favourite ship of the entire series earlier than the books intended. That and Harry should hopefully get to leave the Dursleys. 

  
The train lurched forward and Kendra was reminded of her last train experience during her trip to the country. Hopefully, she wouldn’t experience motion sickness again, though that hadn’t developed until ten years from her new age anyways. 

  
It wasn’t too long before the trolley lady swung by, and Neville used a few galleons from his gran for some snacks, and then Harry did his thing and bought the contents of the entire trolley. Lana couldn’t help but wonder how much extra stock there was and where it could be. 

  
They had some of everything, of course, and played a game with the Bertie Botts every-flavour beans. It was hilarious to watch everyone else get the nasty flavours when both Lana and Kendra were lucking out with every one of them. The trolley lady came by once more, and asked again, though regrettably. Harry got more chocolate frogs.

  
Between the six of them (Four excluding Neville and Ron who already had copies of the common cards,) they each had a Dumbledore, Newt Scamander and Miranda Goshawk card. Ron pulled the Nicholas Flamel card, Kendra got one with the druid Cliodhna painted on, Neville got a Ludo Bagman one, Harry got Godric Gryffindor, Hermione got Helga Hufflepuff, Kendra and Lana got Salazar Slytherin and Rowena Ravenclaw respectively. 

  
They saw a town that could only be Hogsmeade in the distance and got changed, boys turned away from the girls and vice-versa. Once at the station, Harry, Lana and Kendra spotted Hagrid and hurried over to greet him. He instructed all the first years to follow him to the shoreline.

  
Once there, he had us settle into small, wooden, rickety-looking boats, four per. Harry, Ron and Neville got into a boat accompanied by Dean Thomas. Hermione got in her boat with Seamus Finnegan and two other students that Lana thought were Ravenclaws. Kendra ended up in a boat with Draco Malfoy and Greg Goyle. Neither were too happy that they had to sit with a couple of muggle-born kids, instead of their elite group. 

  
Kendra just sat quietly, desperately trying to look anywhere but the sky or the reflective surface of the lake. Lana and Draco hadn’t even known each other five minutes before getting into a heated argument about something trivial. It helped distract Kendra from the stars and moon above them at least. 

  
Hogwarts was as beautiful as either could imagine. Even Draco gasped at the sight. It was magnificent, even in the dark, the way that the castle’s many windows illuminated its stone-masoned walls was so captivating. It was significantly bigger than they thought it would be, and both were grateful that they would not be having to spend their time in either of the tower dorms. 

  
Hagrid bellowed from the front for everyone to duck, and most needlessly listened to him. Kendra and Lana stayed upright, watching the singular light that was Hagrid’s light as they slowed down. Their necks were tickled by the vines, but that was it. 

  
The boats seamlessly docked, and everyone got out to follow Hagrid up some stairs to the side. Greg Goyle got out first, helping Malfoy out, and then Malfoy offered a hand to Lana. Sceptical of his intentions, she glared at him and pulled herself out, then reached down to help Kendra out. 

  
The hand didn’t help though, Kendra slipped on the seat that acted as a step for everyone else. Lana fell into the water, and Kendra hit her head on the side of the boat before joining Lana. 

  
The group surrounding them collectively laughed, especially Malfoy. It made Lana briefly wonder if she could successfully silently hex him and the rest of the crowd without any training. She opted not to for now.

  
It took several moments for Hagrid to realize what had happened, and he wandered back over and lifted the girls out of the water. He asked if they were okay and then led the group around to the front of the castle.

  
Wet and shivering, Lana and Kendra found Harry, Neville, Hermione and Ron again to finish off the journey. 

  
Minerva opened the large wooden doors as they joined the rest of the first years, and Hagrid walked on ahead to sit in the great hall. She welcomed each new student individually and courteously dried off their robes upon seeing them.

  
She gave her well-rehearsed speech about the houses and then disappeared behind the doors to the hall. Kendra took a nervous breath, ready for the official start to their fictional? journey. 


	5. Officially Sorted

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I had so much classwork to do, woops? But here it is, almost as late pace-wise as my two overdue assignments already.

Lana and Kendra followed the crowd into the great hall, as the last to enter they got a glimpse of Filch coming to close the doors, which was the last unsightly thing of the night. They looked up at the ceiling, well, Lana first until she confirmed that there were no stars, then Lana tugged on Kendra’s sleeve, and she looked up too.

  
The candles and enchanted sky were so capturing that they bumped into the backs of the Patil Twins. They apologized, and it was brushed off with no problems. There were less students around than either of them had really expected. Technically both knew the number, but the amount of space and offered classes just didn’t seem warranted to them. 

  
“Hey Lana,” Kendra whispered, “Some of the classes in upper years must only be like, ten people in them!”

  
Lana nodded excitedly, both had had grad classes nearly on par with the total students of the school.

  
The Sorting Hat sang his song, which was hilarious to hear, but he was shockingly good at the same time, and then the sorting began. The first sorted of the year was of course Hannah Abbot, and then Minerva called up each student alphabetically. 

  
When she got to their names, calling Kendra up first, her heart rate surged with anxiety. In that moment it didn’t matter that she was already certain of her house, but now she’d also be a bit more separated from Lana. Normally that would be a non-issue but it seems she’d grown attached. 

  
Kendra made it to the front of the crowd and walked up to the stool. She sat down, and Minerva sat the hat on her head, nearly as fast as the hat had sorted Draco, it put her in Hufflepuff.

  
Her robes turned yellow and she dashed off to sit With Susan, Hannah, Megan, Justin and Roger. Then she turned back to watch as Lana made it up to the stool as well.

The hat was on for a few seconds before it spoke to Lana. _Your thirst for knowledge would fit Ravenclaw well._

_I am not a Ravenclaw._ Lana thought at it.

_No, I suppose you may fit in with the Gryffindors too, you’d enjoy the tower._

_And be with a bunch of brave buffoons? No thank you._

_Ah, I see, you wish to be with your twin? Alright, HUFF_

_HEy. No. WRong. You’re WRONG._

_Yeah, I know, I just saw this discussion between you and your sister, and couldn’t resist it in the slightest._

_I really hate you._

_I’m sure. SLYTHERIN!_

  
With that, Lana hopped off the stool and marched off to the Slytherin table. The students weren’t quite sure what to do with this information as they were all pretty sure McCarthy was in no way a pure-blood name. It could be a half-blood name, she’d be interrogated for sure, but for now they just stared and left her alone.

  
Lana just sat down and kept to herself, watching the front of the room even though she already knew where everyone would go.

  
She politely clapped for Harry, while the rest of the room cheered loudly, the rest of the Slytherins followed in a light clap as well. Then she got bored and looked at the Hufflepuff table, Kendra was already watching her. They nodded at each other and then Kendra went back to talking with her year-mates. It’s going to take some effort for Lana to get such open conversation with her own, but doing so would help with their endgame of changing things for the better.

  
Dumbledore did his speech, warning everyone to not go in the forbidden forest or the third floor corridor. Then the food appeared. It was so much more than the movie or the books could have conveyed, there was so much to eat, and so many choices to make. There was more then enough for a vegan even to get by. 

  
Kendra piled her dinner plate with mashed potatoes and Yorkshire puddings and gravy and asparagus and lamb. Once she cleared that she put some fresh mixed greens on her plate and smelled at a few pouring dishes that were likely dressings and found a vinaigrette that smelled of maple. 

  
Lana’s plate was a little more colourful, and she’d opted for some chicken that was marinated with raspberries and balsamic vinegar. She had a little of each presented desert as well. Thanks to Harry, all she’d had in the last month was treacle tarts. 

  
Kendra thought she was too full to have some desert, until she realized there were several apple related ones on the table, then she had a little of each of those. The ghosts had come through a little while ago, and she’d had a nice conversation with the Fat Friar, it was quite similar to how the movies had introduced the ghosts, but they stayed and got to know each of the first years for quite a while before floating off to talk with those they’d known for longer. 

  
As things wound down and the great hall got quieter, and the older students began to make their way to their dorms, the prefects began to gather the first year students. Kendra made sure to wave to Harry before heading off behind her group, with Lana not too far behind with the Slytherins. 

  
In theory, both of them could likely find their way just fine, but that would be suspicious. As Kendra walked, she was bobbing her head, singing ‘don’t be suspicious’ over and over again in her head, at the same time identifying all the landmarks she could, especially ones she recognized from the movies and books so that she could save herself when she inevitably would get lost. It doesn’t matter how many times she’s seen it, read it or been inside it, Hogwarts was huge and her sense of direction when she wasn’t driving’s atrocious. 

  
Lana on the other hand, just followed her prefects keeping rather close to Draco Malfoy. He was irritated with her presence already, but unsure whether or not to bully her. He knew for sure she wasn’t a pureblood, but had no evidence that could allow him to get away with calling her a mudblood or not. His father had already made sure he knew that Slytherins always stand by other Slytherins. 

  
Draco also wasn’t sure if his father meant only in public or within the dorms too, lord knows Lucius Malfoy is a diplomat where people can see him and an awful man behind closed doors. 

  
So Draco resolved to just deal with Lana walking so close to him and owl his father about it in the morning, when his mothers owl would arrive with treats like she’d promised before having one of their elves had taken him to the platform. 

  
The group comes to an abrupt stop, which surprised Lana as there were no paintings nearby, and she’d wrongly assumed that each of the dorms were behind a painting. 

  
The seventh year female prefect turns to the wall on their left, taps her wand on the bottom most brick and said “sang pur.”

  
The bricks unfolded, much like Diagon Alley, through the opening Lana watched as a long hall opened up that looked incredibly medieval. It smelled a bit like mildew, which she would just have to get used to over time. Once she stepped over the threshold though, the musty smell didn’t matter. 

  
The common room was ornate, comfortable chairs and couches littered the space, a fireplace off to one side that had snakes carved all over the mantle to look like they were climbing it. The stone of the room gave off an almost silver sheen, and there were accents of green all over the room, various shades but none of them particularly bright. 

  
The prefects all stood across from the first year students. They stared each other down for several silent moments, daring each other to look away. Of course most of the first years did, so after several long, drawn out minutes it was down to only Lana and Draco staring back at the older students. They kept staring and staring until it was only the male seventh year prefect and Lana.

  
“Alright, that’s enough.” The female seventh year cuts in, and the male looked away first making Lana grin triumphantly. 

  
“I am Miranda Slughorn, seventh year prefect and kind of the top dog around here. You’ll be under my care for the year, and I will always be your alibi, but DON’T get caught. I’m sure Snape will tell you something similar. Anyways, I’m off to bed, girls follow the left hall, your names will be on a plaque. Boys, if a dungbomb goes off, you went the wrong way.”

  
Miranda turned dramatically, flaring her robes as she walked away. She turned left and disappeared from sight. The male prefect, Vincent Travers gave a small lecture as well that Lana didn’t pay attention to, but she waited until Millicent, Daphne, Pansy and Tracey walked towards the hall as well. 

  
Knowing of the Gryffindor dorm situation, Lana expected to have three roommates, but was pleased to see that they each had their own rooms, and they were huge and she at least had her own bathroom. Like the common room, the colour scheme was green and silver, and her ceiling was made of glass. She watched as a group of Grindylows swam over it. 

  
Over in Hufflepuff, Kendra was already making friends with everyone. The entirety of the house was in their common room, welcoming their ten new students. Games of exploding snap had already begun in the few free spaces, and the first years were being passed around from group to group, though they eventually got to settle where they chose. 

  
Kendra managed to sink into a pouf next to one nearly fourteen-year-old Cedric Diggory. They clicked quickly, Cedric and his friends regaling her with stories of their past two years, and talking about their choices in electives. They informed her of the kitchen’s whereabouts (60 whole feet from the door, which explains how they have a constantly full snack table.) 

  
Cedric was already so confident and incredibly kind, she could see why he’d be picked as champion in a few years’ time. He was also very considerate, making sure she felt welcomed and included in the conversation. They talked well into the night, and their group was of the last to go up to the dorms. 

  
Though she wasn’t actually told where to go, Kendra found her way to her dorm just fine. There was a room of three, Hannah, Megan and Sophie, and the other room had just Kendra and Susan within. 

  
Their beds were across from each other, and the space was vast, a door off to one side led to a beautiful bathroom. A bathtub that would fit Kendra in her later teen years, a spa-esk shower, a double sink with lots of space and provided face care things. She’d have to talk to the other years about body wash and hair stuff, or one of the upper classmates with access to Hogsmeade, though she doesn’t have the funds for it. Maybe Lana will have more luck in that department? Either way they’d both need cleanliness items. 

  
In that moment Kendra wondered why ever Cedric would even use the prefect bathroom, its probably not nicer than these, just bigger. 

  
She fell asleep, finally, sometime around two in the morning. She hoped that her body wouldn’t make a habit of this, especially considering her older self’s severe insomnia. If it persists, she supposed she could just go to the hospital wing. Or maybe her fellow Hufflepuffs would be as stoner-like as was frequently predicted. 


	6. A Boring Ole Day

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hi Hi! Sorry for the massive delay. For several reasons (depression, job, classes that my depression caused me to drop, and hype fixation on how the fuck Hogwarts' schedule would have worked.) I started the day with 100 words to the chapter that I wrote AGES ago. But that's fine because when I got home from work today, I said screw it and made my own version of Hogwarts. I was not intending on having any extra OCs in here, so I'll hold them all back as long as I can. Happy Reading!
> 
> **There is text taken directly from The Philosopher's Stone. Page 127 of my PDF, chapter 8.

The next morning, Lana, Harry and Kendra already broke the unspoken house rules of not associating. Though it wasn’t strange to the student body that the twins sat together, the addition of the Wizarding World’s second most famous individual was interesting. Of course, they waited for their schedules before Lana and Kendra ran over to the Gryffindor table to eat with Harry.

  
They loaded their plates full of delicious carbs, and fruits, and Kendra wished for a glass of lemonade that promptly appeared in front of her. There was a bowl of grapes nearby, and Lana couldn’t help herself.

  
“Hey, got any grapes?” they cackled, the students around them staring.

  
The Weasley twins took an immediate interest in them, and they anchored what would hopefully be a great friendship, hyped Neville up, told Hermione about the first lessons that “their older classmates told them about,” and successfully out ate Ron.

  
Kendra was thriving on the positivity around them, soaking in the energy that she knew would only last so long before the happy wave would come crashing. She started her time as a Hogwarts student in Charms with the Ravenclaws, and Lana was off in Potions with the Gryffindor kids. 

  
They’d spent years trying to figure out how the schedules functioned with such a limited number of staff and 280 students. It turns out that there were several witches and wizards studying towards a mastery in the different subjects, so the classes were covered accordingly. Each of the core subjects had a mastery student, and it seemed that those people helped with the classes above the OWLS. 

  
The only core classes that didn’t have a mature student was Astronomy, which was understandable considering the fact that first and second years are the only ones with class time outside of the midnight hours; and History because Binn’s ghost was apparently a machine. Kendra had three days to prepare herself for Astronomy class and she was panicking just thinking about it. 

  
The mishmash of houses finished their breakfast, and Lana left with their Gryffindor year counterparts to the Dungeons with her at the head of the group. Kendra looked for the Ravenclaws of her year to follow them to their head of house’s classroom. 

  
Lana was beyond ready to hear her head of house’s speech, having read it a thousand times. Heard it just as many. As they approached the open door to their class, she had to mentally remind herself over and over not to mouth the words along with him.

  
She settled into a spot next to Harry, casually writing the answers to Snape’s rapid fire questions that he shoots at him right away, telling him briefly that she’d read about them while they were living in Diagon Alley. That maybe, Snape would talk about ingredients on the first day. 

  
The class is mostly separated between houses, the only other pair of Slytherins and Gryffindors Theodore Nott and Neville, though she was sure that pairing would not last long, though she wasn’t sure how Snape would change it after the first mishap. 

  
Everyone had started to settle, though restlessly by the time Snape walked in, flairing his cape. He stalked to the front of the classroom and it felt rather feline, turning once more with one more swoosh. 

  
“You are here to learn the subtle science and exact art of potion-making,” he began. He spoke in barely more than a whisper, but they caught every word. “There is little foolish wand-waving here, many of you will hardly believe this a strong subset of magic. I don’t expect you will really understand the beauty of the softly simmering cauldron with its shimmering Fumes, the delicate power of liquids that creep through human veins, bewitching the mind, ensnaring the senses. . . . I can teach you how to bottle fame, brew glory, even stopper death — if you’re intelligent enough to keep up.” 

  
Lana’s eyes were shining with excitement, and she guessed that it was similar to how Hermione must look, even if it were for completely different reasons. She dared not look behind her to check though. 

  
Snape stood watching the class an extra moment, his eyes lingering harshly on Harry nearly as long as he looked at his slytherins with a slightly less menacing stare.   
He drew his wand, hovering the roll in front of him before calling each out. Paying enough attention to the Gryffindors to check their names off, and taking the time to nod at each of his own house. The roll was definitely in alphabetical order, so he must have saved Harry for last on purpose. 

  
“Ah yes,” he said, voice even. “Harry Potter, our new– celebrity.”

  
Thanks to Lana, Harry was able to avoid being tormented, and Snape even begrudgingly awarded Gryffindor three points. One for each right answer. 

  
For the rest of the class, Snape laid out the rest of the term. The entire first term --of four-- would be nothing but theory, which was definitely different from the books, but would likely help everyone avoid making more disasterous mistakes than if they straight up just starting trying to brew. It would be two and a half months before they’d move beyond studying how things worked, and then they’d spend a week minimum studying each individual potion before actually attempting to brew each one. Though the time studying each of those potions was TBD based on how Snape percieves everyone’s skill level and comfort with the steps. 

  
Kendra’s experience in Charms was very similar. Though Flitwick wasn’t mean, quite the opposite actually. His openning speech wasn’t particularly inspiring, but it proved to her that he was certainly Ravenclaw. Charms would also be two and a half months of theory, but, Flitwick did say they’d be starting basic wand movements in a month or so.

  
She planned to rely a little heavily on the Ravenclaws of her class, though as she listened, she also figured her and Lana would spend a lot of time somewhere private studying and getting ahead. 

  
Flitwick asked the class some basic questions to gauge where the group’s pre-existing knowledge was at, almost playing a wizarding version of Jeopardy.   
Kendra even managed to get a few answers, and nine points for Hufflepuff before the Ravenclaws answered every single one of the rest until even Flitwick got tired of them. 

  
Once that was over, it was off to Transfiguration, where she met up with Harry and the other Gryffindors, opting to sit with him a couple rows from the front. McGonagall did her whole cat to human animagus thing, which was impressive, but Kendra apparently didn’t react the way the professor expected her to as a muggleborn, so she chose to just sit and listen and stain the side of her hand with ink for taking the occasional note. 

  
This class would be the most information heavy, she was sure of it. It would be one that she’d pay the most attention to though, she wanted to be an animagus for so many reasons. 

  
Meanwhile, Lana was off suffering through the very first History of Magic class with Professor Binns. 

  
It was as boring as could be, his ghost drawling on in a tenor, monotone voice that was already putting her to sleep. Even the Ravenclaws that sat around her looked bored out of her mind. 

  
Clearly, the only way anyone passes the History classes was through reading the books and reading the books alone. Those would certainly be more interesting than listening to Binn’s speak on. The words he was saying had morphed rather quickly into the murmur language of a background cartoon character. 

  
Lunch came after what seemed like eons and Lana happily found Kendra and sat with her at the Hufflepuff table. They swapped information about the two classes they’d had separately so far, already making a study plan. They’d just need to pick out a place to do the studying, the room of requirement was a top option, but a plain old library table would also do for all their normal studying. 

  
The rest of the day passed in a blur, though they had a double block of Defence with Quirrell. This class would also start with theory, technically. They’d be working on learning about things that may need defending from rather than performing any spells in this class. So Quirrell and Umbridge were rather similar in that regard, which the fake twins giggled about quietly in the back of the classroom. 

  
Dinner was not nearly as extravagant as the day before, but it was still delicious. They spent dinner with their own houses this time, and repeated the cycle the next day. Starting together in Herbology, and then Potions and History for Kendra, and Charms and Transfiguration for Lana. Herbology would be their only immediately hands on class for the first time, well, for Kendra. She wanted to work quickly to find a spell that will allow her to not hear what Sinistra would be saying to them throughout the semester. 

  
They knew that muffliato was a thing, but as far as they knew, the only people who would know that spell other than Snape were Death Eaters and the golden trio in five years. They also weren’t sure if it would work on one single person. If it had to be cast on a space, it’s not the right spell.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Just a heads up, chapter seven may take literally FOREVER, because I have to face very, very severe astrophobia (fear of outerspace fml) to write it because Lana loves space and I am fucking dedicated okay? I WILL suffer to write, and personally I feel like that is the number one rule as a writer. You gotta suffer a bit to get decent writing.


End file.
